


No talk will cure what’s lost, or save what’s left

by McFearo



Category: Elder Scrolls Online
Genre: Cults, Found Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:55:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22982878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/McFearo/pseuds/McFearo
Summary: Adalene and her friends are only children; at ten years old, she's the eldest of the bunch, even. They are also members of a Daedric cult -- because their parents are members of the Daedric cult. And the inherent danger of Daedric cults is that sometimes, they get into plots and schemes, and sometimes, a hero comes and cleans up house.Now Adalene and her friends are in need of new guardianship. Their liberator, an old witch named Eifrid the Willful, can't raise them herself, but she knows a man who has the means to look after them, and in fact, who has an advantage: having once escaped the very same cult himself, Mathis is uniquely equipped to understand what Adalene and her friends have gone through.Unfortunately, Mathis is a prickly walking disaster of an adult with only threadbare moral fiber and a daily functionality barely held together by his own intense self-interest. He certainly doesn't want the responsibility of raising five children, and they don't much want him either.Too bad he owes a debt to Eifrid the Willful, and so he doesn't really get a say in the matter.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	No talk will cure what’s lost, or save what’s left

It was only just past sunset and there should still be light in the sky, but as they came to the outer edges of the vinyards the storm that had been rolling in was so thick and black overhead it looked like deep night already. Nala, Benny, and Bo were huddled on the back of the witch’s pet wolf, which was so big it stood shoulder-high to a man and had room enough to carry all three of the little ones. Ada walked alongside it with Lark and the witch -- Granny Will, she'd told them to call her -- and kept her eyes on the city towering ahead.

She'd never been to Alinor before, nor Summerset at all. She wasn't sure how to feel about it; it stood tall in a way no other city she'd been to had. But everything was ugly in the storm and the dim, and the dreadful feeling she had about her future. 

"What's it you're ruminating on, girl?" Granny Will asked, and Ada glanced up. Granny was huge, maybe bigger than the handful of other Nords she'd seen; Ada had gotten used to her and Lark being about chest-high to most grown men from Stormhaven, but the tops of their heads barely came past Granny's waist.

Ada glanced aside at the little ones, and Granny nodded and gestured for her to follow. They walked a little farther from the wolf and the children on its back, leaving Lark with them while Ada talked to Granny out of earshot.

"I don't know if I want to go live with your friend," Ada said.

"Well, I can't rightly take you back to your parents, and you can't stay with me. I'm afraid there ent much choice in things."

Granny didn't sugarcoat anything; Ada knew they weren't going home. Not all of them had homes left to go to. At least, that was what Ada gathered. 

They'd been told to get out of sight when the fighting started and they'd hidden away, heard sounds of spells, and then... Just Granny, stomping room to room, shoving open the door to the one they'd huddled in, looking surprised at the sight of them and batting aside the sword Ada picked up to defend the little ones with her bare hand.

She'd done something, before she let them out and walked them away from that place. There was deep snow all over the ruins, despite clear warm weather an hour before, and all the people who'd been there -- who hadn't gone away already on some special errand with Mistress Galanox, like Benny's and Nala's parents -- were gone. But... Ada understood what the little ones probably didn't, about that walk out over the strange, magic snow Granny had conjured.

What was she going to do without her parents? What happened now? All Ada knew was that Granny was going to take them to a man she knew, to watch over them. 

"What if he's awful?" she asked aloud.

"He’s alright. Far as I figure anyhow, though we ent close." Granny shrugged. "I'll tells you, don't rightly matter if he's an awful person. He'll not be awful to _you_."

"How do you know?" Ada asked.

"Because he owes me, and he knows he can't afford any more enemies, leastways one like me." Granny tapped her nose and winked. "You'll see. Maybe you can't live with me but I can protect you even when I'm away, you just watch."

Ada pursed her lips and let it go, looking up as they approached a wide archway.

"Maybe I don't want to live with a stranger, even if he isn't awful," she said.

"Aye." Granny nodded, but plodded on as they moved into the city proper, the paving stones slick under their boots. "Ent fond of change myself. But, we can't undo what's unwinding already. Just try and get to the end of it, and settle down into the new way of things." She thumped Ada gently on the back; it didn't hurt, but she skipped forward a step to not trip over.

They drifted closer to the others as the streets grew narrow and winding. Fat raindrops started falling on them, first one at a time, then torrents. Granny didn't seem bothered. She threw her cloak over the little ones, and she didn't have anything for Lark or Ada, but not for herself either, so the three of them walked in the rain with Granny getting as soaked as the girls did, her stringy grey hair flattening onto her head and her black war paint running down her craggy cheeks.

Alinor went up and up, all tall and narrow -- like the Altmer. There weren't many people out in the streets with the weather and the late hour, and most of them that they saw were servants: Khajiit and dark elves mainly, and some others. But once in a while, a pinched gold face looked out of a skinny window at them and wrinkled its nose at Granny and the wolf as they went by, and then the curtains would draw shut.

All of the children, Ada included, were too tired to chatter. Still, except for Ambrose -- who was nodding off with his little freckly little head on Benny's shoulder -- they all stared in wonder at everything they passed as they went deeper and higher into the city. Lightning cracked far away, behind the soaring spires and arches at the top of the mountain, and thunder rumbled through after.

"Somewhere around here," Granny murmured, squinting up at the buildings. "Ah, here. Bastard's done well for himself, ent he? Eh, well, he's tricksy, and ten years is enough time to get up to all sorts."

"He lives _here_?" Lark asked. They stood on the steps in front of a towering white townhouse that butted up against a cliff’s edge on one side and another building on the other, all the same clean white stone. Two stories, but each built tall and grand, and a third floor that jutted up from one wing of the building like a tower. The bottom floor was mostly dim, but there were lights still burning upstairs, shining through intricate camework windows of clear glass.

"Leastways he's _in_ there, I can tells you that much. Let's say hello and get out of this rain." Granny thumped up the steps and pounded a fist on the door.

It was a long wait, and Granny got impatient and knocked again before they heard a deep voice yelling that they were coming. Finally the latch clicked and the door swung inward, and an armored Orc blinked at Granny, then looked _up_ at Granny.

"Ma'am?" she asked, wide-eyed.

"I'd speak to the master of the house," Granny told her. "Assuming that's Mathis?"

The Orc woman leaned to look past, frowning at the children. "You got sick kids or something? Ser Mathis doesn't take new patients without an appointment."

"They'll catch a sickness out here, maybe, but not at the moment, no." The Orc was very tall, so Granny didn't have to lean down very far to look her in the eye, but she must have been surprised to have to look up at anyone at all. Her hand settled on the sword hilt at her side as Granny told her: "Go and tell him it's Eifrid and you'll see he gets me in. Aye?"

"I'm going to ask you to get out of my face, lady." The Orc tilted her chin up. "My instructions are no one's coming in here tonight. I'm sorry. Go and get you and your grandkids a room at an inn, come back in the morning and ask for an appointment."

"Ulumgakh?" a woman's voice said from farther inside, low and husky. "Who is it?" The Orc turned her head only enough to keep Granny in the corner of her eye as she answered.

"Says her name is _Eyefreed_ , ma'am. Seems to think that ought to mean something and Mathis'll want to see her for it."

"Curious," the voice said. "Who is to say but Mathis? He might be busy, but this one will see. There are children? Let them into the foyer out of the rain, but keep an eye."

"Yes, ma'am." The Orc opened the door wider and jerked her head for Granny to enter as she stepped aside to make room. Through another doorway behind her, Ada just saw a silhouette moving upstairs and out of sight in the room beyond. "The dog safe to sit out here?" Ulumgakh didn't seem to bat an eye at the size of him.

"He won't make trouble. Frodi, _lay down_." The wolf lay on his belly on the top of the steps, and Lark and Ada helped the little ones off his back, all bundled under Granny's cloak. Little Bo held Lark's hand as they followed Granny inside, wobbling sleepily on his feet and rubbing at his eyes, and Nala wasn't much more awake, but Benny stared at everything in amazement.

Their footsteps on the darker stone of the floors echoed sharply inside the house; the ceilings were vaulted, the white stone walls carved with curling and delicate shapes and hung with paintings, though of what they could only barely make out. Ada tried to peek at what lay in the dark rooms the passed, saw the shape of a desk and a couch, a study maybe, to one side and a grand dining room to another, but little detail. There was a strange feeling, like something buzzing at her ear as she passed close to the door jambs, but she couldn't place it.

While they stood shivering in the foyer, a Dunmer woman with dark skin and long white hair came out from another room, carrying towels. "Sorry-- hello," she said, ducking her head and curtsying a little with her arms full. "I heard someone was coming in out of the rain, and thought-- Oh!" Her red eyes widened at the lot of them and at the size of Granny. "I don't think I brought enough. I'll get more," she said, as Granny took the towels out of her hands.

"Thank you, dear," Granny chuckled, "none for me, it ent about to let up afore I leaves here anyway." She handed them out to the children as the elf bustled out of sight. Overhead they could faintly hear voices, but too muffled to really follow. Another Orc in nice armor came in from a farther room, apparently only because he wanted to gawk and lean on the wall next to the first while they whispered to each other and watched.

Lark stepped a little between them and the little ones. They flashed awkward smiles at her anyway, as adults often did when they caught childrens’ eyes, showing long tusks like Lark hadn’t grown into yet. She didn’t smile back, but ducked her head and looked away shyly.

"You his guards, then?" Granny asked them.

The lady Orc nodded once. Her reddish hair was shaved off at the sides and tied at the back of her head in a bun, and her face was pierced full of gold jewelry. "Ulumgakh gra-Yagharz," she said.

"Mazalakh gro-Khazol," her friend added, thumping his chest. He had bushy black hair tied back in a tail, and a bushy black beard to go with it.

Granny grinned at them, crooked teeth and drippy black war paint and all. She took up the cloak that had been slopped to the floor when they were drying the little ones off, and slung it over her shoulder, still dripping. "Eifrid the Willful, they calls me, or they calls me Granny Will if you like’t better. As for these ones--" As Granny spoke Ada realized the voices had stopped, though she wasn't sure when. She looked up the stairs, wondering how long they’d be waiting, and screamed.

Two figures stood silently on the landing above them, just black silhouettes but for the dots of four eyes glowing blue-green and gold in the dark and staring directly at them. Ada reached for the sword on her hip, but Granny caught her shoulder with one big hand and stilled her.

"There he is," she grunted. "Kept us waiting long enough, you did."

"Will. To what do I owe the pleasure?" A man’s voice spoke with... not _quite_ a monotone. His voice went up and down, almost exaggerated, but without feeling, as if he was bored or annoyed and making a point about it.

"You know why I'm here," Granny said, crossing her arms. "Broadly speaking."

Everyone in the room was silent, and for a moment the man didn't move. He was very still, and Ada almost wondered if she was looking at a living person or a shadow he was casting from somewhere else. But then lightning flashed outside, illuminating the man and the Khajiit for a moment, their eyes glinting in the light, before it went dim again. Finally he laid a hand on the bannister and began to walk down towards them, the Khajiit woman moving with him.

"Such drama," Granny broke the silence. "Can't we get a light in here?"

As if on cue, a light beamed out through an archway to the side of the foyer and then grew brighter as the dark elf woman came back with a candle. "Sorry about that," she said meekly, holding out another stack of towels bundled under her other arm, and going to light a lamp on the wall with her candle.

In the light, the man was less imposing, but he was strange. Human, too tall and round-eared to be a Breton. He only had dark trousers on and a long shearling coat, not even any slippers, and had short blond hair and eyebrows almost the same color as his skin. There were markings inked into his bare chest that were familiar, and Ada took Lark's hand on reflex.

The man, Mathis presumably, offered a hand with several rings on it to Granny, whose own hand engulfed it. He was not a short man by any means, but Granny was a head above him.

"You know how I love drama, but I let Viranis put out the lights and turn in early because I don't need them. You're keeping her up," he said bluntly.

"Not I, lad. You're a grown man as can light his own damn lamps without a maid, ent you?" Granny looked to Viranis. "Sorry all the same, girl. It's important business." The Dunmer bowed her head, looking uncomfortable to be the subject of the conversation. "You've done well for yourself," Granny said, turning back to Mathis. "Grand, shiny home in a shiny city, staff to guard you and put out your lights and tell callers you can't sees ‘em today. You're a _medicine man_ now?"

Mathis looked around at his grand foyer and ‘hmm’ed in vague agreement. "Yes. Of a sort; a private physician, surgeon, and apothecary. To the well-heeled, that is, which in Alinor is mostly the Altmer." He shrugged, adjusting his soft-looking coat on his shoulders. "But I'm well enough to live comfortably, in any case, and well-connected enough to not be easily bothered by..." He trailed off, glancing past her to the door a moment. There was something strange about his eyes, but it was hard to see in the dim lamplight to make out exactly what.

"... Those whom I don't wish to be bothered by," he said at length. "You're not here to check after my well-being."

"It's good to know, anyhow." Granny smiled a little and thumped him on the shoulder. He rocked a little on his feet from the blow, but managed not to stumble. "I'm here for your end of the deal."

"Right. Your favor. I assume your request has nothing to do with the children you brought in like drowned rats?" the man droned hopefully, the corner of his mouth twitching like he was aiming for a smile but was too tired to really shoot for it.

"No, I just brings them for the worldly experience." Granny recrossed her arms and frowned down at him. "You're to care for them and raise them as your own. That's the favor."

He scoffed. "You're not serious."

"Don't I look it?"

Mathis looked at them, eyes darting from one to another and twisting his mouth in a frown. He glanced to the Khajiit at his side as if she would say something, but she was giving him a surprised smile that said she didn't know what was happening either, but that it was awfully funny that it was happening to Mathis in front of her.

"I'm hardly fit to raise children, Will."

"You look fit enough, strapping young lad that you are," Granny said, and thwapped his bare belly with the back of her hand. He reeled back a step, looking offended and clutching at his skinny front.

"And you'll get fitter or get help. It takes a village, they say, and you've all but got one in this house," she added, gesturing around at the silent crowd of Khajiit, Orcs, and Dunmer.

"I'm sorry," he said, holding his arms up crossed before him and sweeping them out as if to ward her off, "but you're going to have to ask something else. I can't help you here."

"We had a deal," snapped Granny, squaring up her shoulders. "I done you a good turn when you came to my cottage watching over your shoulder for wolves at your heels, and we agreed you'd owe me _any one thing_ I asked in return for't, whatsoever and whensoever I asked.

“Well, you had ten years free of the debt but here I am now, and I tells you: _here's_ your one thing, boy."

"And I'm telling _you_ that I can't--"

_"If you keep but one oath in your pitiful life, for your sake it better be the one you made a_ witch, _Mathis Galanox!"_ Granny's voice boomed throughout the foyer, making all of them flinch, even Mathis -- all except for the two orcs, who reached for weapons. Mathis held up a hand to stop them.

"Galanox?" Lark asked with a gasp. Granny waved her off.

" _Galanox_?" Ada repeated, stepping forward and looking up at Mathis, who glanced between the two girls and finally landed on Ada to look at her for the first time for more than a moment. He went very still again.

In the quiet, Mathis cleared his throat. "Yes? Do you know me?"

Ada shook her head, not looking away. "I know a _Sybil_ Galanox," she said slowly, suddenly unsure -- but no. It was impossible to not see the resemblance, now it couldn't just be a coincidence. He looked so much like Mistress Galanox, it was a wonder she hadn't thought of it at once.

Mathis stared at her, his face gone pale in the weak lamplight. He finally tore his eyes up to Granny. "How do they know Sybil?"

"How do you think?" Granny said grimly.

Ada huffed, "We're right here,” but they ignored her.

"Your old friends are stirring up trouble in my backyard, lad. There’s something rotten astir in Stormhaven," said Granny, “and I'll not let them go on with whatever they're plotting, but the fight ent without collateral it seems." She gestured to the children. "These ones need a home now, and you know where they come from. You been there, know better than anyone else could what they’ve seen -- you're the one I trust to this task."

"Because we share a--" Mathis twirled his hand in the air like he couldn't or wouldn't say the rest. "That doesn't just make me a trustworthy guardian. I'm _me_ , Will."

" 'Course it don't, and 'course you are. Reason I trust you to guard them is for fear of what I'll do if you fail." She poked him in the chest with a finger nearly as thick as two of his. "You'll see to their happiness and their health in body and spirit, Mathis Galanox, or I'll have a new rug of you for my dogs to lay on, I swear’t before Kyne." She stared him down, and Mathis stared back. Ada and Lark looked to each other and shuffled back a step to not be between them, but to move closer to the little ones, who were watching with open mouths. Except for Little Bo, who had lain down on the hard tiled floor and gone back to sleep, head on his arms. "Do we have a deal, then?"

Mathis took them all in a moment longer, and Ada looked furtively around the room to read the mood. Ulumgakh and Mazalakh watched the exchange with open bafflement, their hands still sitting uneasily on the hilts of their weapons in case their master needed defending. The Dunmer woman stood frozen with her hands over her mouth in worry, and the Khajiit with attentive ears and a curious tilt to her head. At last, Mathis closed his eyes and raised a hand to his face to rub at his temple as if he had a headache coming on. "I haven't got rooms set up to accommodate them, and the shops are closed. They'll have to sleep on couches for tonight." He looked to the Dunmer woman. "Viranis, set them up in the parlor with-- whatever. Things. For sleeping."

"Yes, ser."

"We need dry clothes," Ada said tentatively, and Granny finally looked back at her with a smile and an encouraging wink.

"I haven't _got_ children's clothes," Mathis snapped. "Yet," he added, at a look from Granny. "Get them spare shirts from my closet, Viranis, they should serve as nightclothes," he called as she went up the stairs behind him.

"Yes, ser!"

"Ahnraji," he said to the Khajiit, who tilted her head and smiled at him like the-- well, rather like the cat that caught the canary, "in the morning see to the, the purchase of..." He began to count the children, Ada then Lark, mouth moving silently and his brow furrowing as he leaned to peer around Granny and the number went up past two.

"There's five of us," Lark volunteered.

_"Mara's tits--"_

"Language, Master Mathis," Ahnraji purred, tail swishing with delight, and added: "there are children present."

"Right! Five! Five beds for children, clothes, I don't know-- whatever else they'll need, what do children--"

Ahnraji waved a hand. "This one will direct questions to someone in the know, should they arise."

"We can help," Ada offered.

"Of course, I'm sure you can, you seem _very, very, helpful,_ " Mathis said, smiling tightly at her in a way she knew meant he'd like her to shut up, but he certainly couldn't make her. Granny said so. "Right. Upstairs with you, Viranis will make you a place to sleep." He looked to Granny. "Unless you have further impositions this evening, Will?"

"Chin up, Mathis,” she said with a chuckle, “if anything I done _you_ a favor today, more than otherways around--"

"Oh, without a doubt," Mathis said flatly, lifting an eyebrow.

"-- I gave you the means to square your debt to the world for all you done to earn those," Granny went on, as if he hadn't spoken, and gestured to the black marks all down his chest. Mathis said nothing. A long stare-off followed, Granny smiling faintly down at him, before he finally looked back at the children again.

"Well, what are you lot waiting on? Upstairs."

Ada looked at Granny, who gave her a wink and patted her head a little, then Lark's, then leaned down to nudge at Benny, Nala and Bo. "You'll all do well. Go on to sleep now, you've come a long ways. I'll be back to check on you in time."

Granny watched them ascend the stairs until they were out of sight, and then Ada could hear her big footsteps echoing away, and her deep voice talking briefly to the two Orcs as they saw her back out. Then it was just them, following Mathis deeper into the house. He put a hand out to pause Ada in the hall, looking down.

“Why do you have a sword?”

“To protect us,” said Ada, staring seriously back at him.

“You’re _eight_. Hand it here,” he said. He held out a hand palm up and waggled his fingers impatiently. He had thick, pointy nails that looked more like a Khajiit’s than a man’s.

Ada turned her body so that the sword sheathed on her belt, and Little Bo on her hip, were away from him. “I’m ten, and it’s mine.”

Mathis curled his lip, then turned away, already giving up. “Fine. You cut your hand off, don’t come to me.”

“I _will_ , and you’ll help,” Ada told his back. “Because you said you’re a physician, _and_ Granny said you have to.”

Mathis ignored her. "You're not to go in my private room and study here," he grumbled, gesturing to a pair of double doors as they passed that stood slightly ajar. Checking he was looking ahead, Ada slowed and peeked through the gap. A pale, pale woman in a pale green dress sat in front of a vanity, brushing out her long, dark red hair. Ada adjusted Bo’s weight and glanced after Mathis, who was still walking ahead, saying: "--there's nothing in there for you. And the garden off the back patio, you're not to touch anything there--"

She took one last glance in the room, but the woman was looking right back at her in the mirror, and Ada realized she could see her own reflection peeking through the gap in the door. She jumped and hurried after Mathis.

As she caught up behind, she thought she heard a woman's chuckle behind her, but only just.

Mathis left them with Viranis, who was piling spare pillows and quilts onto two couches in a guest parlor. After they finished changing in the nearby lavatory into the linen shirts Viranis provided -- which were indeed long enough for nightdresses on them -- she took their damp clothes up in a basket, promising to return them in the morning. As she helped the little ones settle, Ada surreptitiously walked over to the door back to the hall and put her ear near it. She felt that buzzing again, and looked over the door jamb, but couldn’t see anything out of place. Still, she was certain: there was magic rooted there. A mystery to look into later.

Viranis promised them breakfast downstairs at dawn and wished them a goodnight, then put out the oil lamps before shuffling out. They lay still and tried to sleep, too tired to get up in defiance but too alert to nod off quickly -- except for Bo.

"I do not like him," Nala said sleepily into the silence after a while. They sounded as if they had been trying to work that one out for some time and had finally come to a decision.

"He's weird," Benny agreed. "And kind of mean."

"Well," Ada said slowly, "we just won't talk to him when we don't have to. He has to look out for us, but we don't have to be his friend."

"Where is my mom?" Nala asked after a pause.

When Ada didn’t answer immediately, Lark spoke up. "She went with Mistress Galanox, don't you remember?"

"She coming back? When?"

"Later," Ada told them. "We'll talk about it later. Go to sleep, Nala. Everyone be quiet and go to sleep."

Silence fell again, and soon she could hear slow breaths that meant they’d nodded off. Ada lay awake a long while on one end of one couch, feet just touching Nala's and Bo's as they cuddled up on the other end. Lark and Benny split the ends of the other couch, just shapes in the dark. The thunderstorm roared on, and if she listened she could just hear Mathis' voice under it, far down the hall, speaking to someone in another room. A woman's faint laughter again as he snapped and grumbled unintelligibly.

It was always strange, trying to sleep in an unfamiliar room. The smells were off, the clean leather upholstery and linens and the wood floors, the way the rain sounded on the elaborate windows. Even the air itself felt strange, and the wrong temperature, and she was too aware of her own skin and hair lying there, with that dirty trespasser feeling of being where you don’t belong and not wanting to touch anything. Or maybe she just hadn’t had a proper bath in too long.

She didn’t like Mathis much either, but they didn’t have anywhere else to go, and Granny… She trusted Granny. Granny said they’d be safe here. As long as they had a roof and food they could take care of themselves, and keep to themselves. Ada would look out for the others, take care of them, and Lark would help her.

They didn’t have to have anything to do with Mathis. Perhaps that would suit him just fine, too.

* * *

The storm abated in the wee hours, but Ada slept fitfully, waking at every unfamiliar noise or for no reason at all that she could discern. Waking up in a strange home was at least as uncomfortable as falling asleep in one, the muffled sounds of someone moving about in other rooms making her feel like an intruder. But this was her home now.

A little before dawn the littlest ones were stirring, and Ada got up to wake them properly and get them washed up and dressed and down to breakfast.

The kitchen was warm and had a long counter that they could pull chairs to, and nibble on bits of cured meats and cheese Viranis handed them to tide them over. She’d returned their clothes to them after they’d washed and apologized for them having to put dirty things back on, but there hadn’t been time to wash _and_ dry them and still sleep, and Mathis had told her just to sleep. So the dirty clothes were the only option, but she had hung them over the hearth overnight, so they were warm and dry if a little tacky from the road.

“Mistress Ahnraji will be up and about soon,” she said as they watched her bustle about making a real breakfast. “Did you sleep well?” Half of them shook their heads, and she gave a sympathetic frown and a click of her tongue. Ada already liked Viranis. She constantly seemed to be worried about something or other, but she always gave a real smile when they caught her eye or spoke to her. She smoothed down her apron as the fire heated the stove. “Ahnraji will be taking you to market to buy new clothes, and Master Mathis asked last night for Mazalakh to move furniture around in a couple of spare rooms today, to make up places for your beds and things that we’ll have delivered. We’ll have you sorted, and tonight will be better.”  
  


“You have pisserves?” Bo asked, and Viranis gave him a startled look.

“He means grape preserves,” Ada told her.

“Oh! Yes.” Viranis moved about cooking up eggs and sausage while the dough she’d left to rise overnight baked up into soft, round loaves. As she worked she told them about her nephews in Vvardenfell, though she smiled a tight smile and changed the subject when asked why she was in Alinor instead of back home.

After a while Ahnraji came around. She was dressed in a silky robe, and she poured herself a cup of coffee Viranis had brewed, then added to it a big scoop of silvery-white granules from a tin she pulled from a high cupboard. She said, “Good morning, little ones,” to them as she stirred her coffee and swept out of the kitchen again without so much as looking at them. “Ahnraji will be with you after coffee,” she added, even as her bushy tail disappeared around the doorframe.

Then Mazalakh came and went, after Viranis announced the food was cooked, grabbing a plate to take back to his post near the front of the house; Ulumgakh had her own home and a family, he told them when they asked, and would be along after breakfast with her wife.

That left Mathis’ part of the morning routine to figure out.

By the time he trudged into the kitchen, full morning light was streaming in through the windows, and they’d already mostly eaten and were only grazing aimlessly on the last morsels, listening to Bo and Nala tell Viranis about all their favorite foods in wandering sentences, their mouths sticky and red with preserves. They all glanced up as Mathis paused just inside the doorway and looked around.

He was still bare from the waist up, even his coat missing this time, just standing there in his bare feet and trousers looking startled to find children in his kitchen. In the bright light it was easier to see the bags under his eyes like he hadn’t slept in a week -- eyes that looked strange on a human man, with pale yellow irises, and a greyish color where they should be white. Mathis looked at each face in turn, and made a bewildered little noise in the back of his throat, before walking into the kitchen proper.

No one talked as they watched him go by. Viranis handed him a heaping plate of cold breakfast and he tucked into it ravenously while standing up, his back to the children, only moving to step out of Viranis’ way as she went on cleaning the kitchen around him in a manner that said this was a normal morning with him.

They could see his tattoos better now, too. Ada had seen glimpses of marks like them before in books, and tattooed down her mother’s arms, but Mathis’ whole body was covered in them as far as she could see, except his face and hands and feet. Long strings of Daedric script were written over arcane sigils, prayers Ada hadn’t learned how to read very well yet, but she could make out bits and pieces.

_We speak to (y)ou in our sleep, when we speak, when we speak--_

_\--She who is the cold iron nail through the back of the skull--_

_If I die before I wake… If I die before I wake…_

He glanced back at them, his left cheek puffed out around a mouthful of cold breakfast sausage. His face was covered in stubble and pox scars. “It’s rude to stare,” he said around his food.

“It’s rude to talk with your mouth full,” Ada said pointedly.

“Only after nine.” He swallowed. “What are your names?” he asked, slowly, like it only just occurred to him that he never asked last night, and that he probably should have. Ada certainly hoped it occurred to him, anyway.

“My name is Larkesh,” Lark volunteered. “Larkesh gra-Narzashabesh. Or Lark. If you like.”

“I’m Adalene Geric. These ones are Ambrose Nurin, Irinalas, and Bernadette Giroux,” Ada said, indicating each of the younger children -- Bo, Nala and Benny -- in turn. Mathis nodded, his eyes going a little unfocused as she said it. He took another bite and chewed thoughtfully, staring into the middle distance a moment with a furrowed brow, then seemed to snap back to reality. 

“Right. Irinalas, is that one a boy name or a girl name?”

Nala pulled the finger they’d been sucking jam from out of their mouth with a pop, and said, calmly but firmly: _“No.”_

Mathis stared at them a moment, then shrugged. “Fair enough, noted.”

“Is the lady coming down to eat?” Ada asked.

“Which lady?”

“The one who was in your room last night,” said Ada. There was a spluttering noise, and she looked over to see Viranis choking on the water she’d been sipping between work. Coughing uproariously, Viranis turned and darted into the larder. Mathis never looked away from Ada; he squinted, but the rest of his face was blank as he chewed very slowly.

“No,” he answered at length. “She left in the night. You needn’t worry about her,” he muttered, turning his attention down to his plate, “she comes and goes.”

“Are you Mitress-- Mi--” Nala looked to Ada.

“Mistress Galanox?” she supplied

They looked back at Mathis. “Are you her _dad?”_ Mathis reeled back, looking horrified.

“No! Gods, how old do you think I am?!”

“Fifty three!” Little Bo guessed.

_“No!”_ He wrinkled his nose. “Mara’s mercy.”

“You don’t look fifty three. You only look very, very tired,” Ada said politely.

Mathis scoffed, and gave her a look that didn’t disagree, before he polished off the last of his breakfast and put the emptied plate into Viranis’ waiting hand, having composed herself and returned from the larder. He seemed to realize they were still watching him as he cleaned his hands in the basin. “I understand you children must be quite curious,” he grumbled, without any ire. “To answer your question: I am Sybil’s brother. _Not,_ ” he added pointedly, “her _dad_. Good gods. But I don’t care to get into that any further.”

“You follow Lady Vaer--” Benny asked quietly, and he held up a finger to stop her.

_“We do not say that name in this house.”_ His jaw clenched tight and something dark came over his face. “We do not say that name in this house. I left that life. Now you have too. So, here we are. We do not follow her, we do not speak of her. Do you understand?” He looked at each of them in turn and waited for a nod of assent before moving on.

It was quiet a moment, and Mathis rubbed a hand over his stubbly chin, thinking. “Ground rules then. You stay out of my study, you don’t go into the garden--” He looked at Lark, who had raised her hand. “... Yes?”

“Why can’t we go in the garden?”

“I grow herbs for medicine there,” Mathis sighed, “and many of them are poison. If you go in there, get sick, and die, it will not be my fault. Do you understand _that_?”

They nodded.

“You do not answer the door, no matter who comes knocking. Mazalakh or Ulumgakh will get it. You obey whatever the adults you’ve met here tell you. When I have clients in my office downstairs, you stay to the upper floor or the back patio, and you keep the noise down. If you need something, you ask Viranis. If Viranis isn’t able to help you, you ask Ahnraji. If you meet and talk to any people outside this house when she takes you shopping today, you do not tell them about your parents, you do not mention Daedra or ruins or rituals or Mistress Galanox, you do not tell them about--” he gestured vaguely to his chest, “about _this._ Are we clear?”

They nodded some more.

“Good. If anyone asks you how you came to live with me, you--” He stopped, put his hands on his bony hips, and looked thoughtfully at the floor.

“... We…?” Lark asked after a moment of silence.

Mathis shook his head and leaned his weight back against the counter behind him. “Hang on, I’m thinking about it.”

“The children were displaced by a distant cousin’s tragic demise, who ran a private orphanage in Anvil,” Ahnraji said breezily as she swept back into the room, now fully done up in a long purple dress and an orange shawl and bedecked in jewels. “The Governor wouldn’t take responsibility for them, so this one arranged passage, and they arrived in port last evening in a private vessel just before the storm blew in from the other direction. Fortuitous indeed.”

Mathis pointed at her in agreement. “A good one, but only if no one saw Will and her fucking huge wolf planted outside my door,” he said, flashing half a smile, or a grimace. He had pointy teeth in places, Ada noted. His canines seemed slightly long.

“This one hired her to guard them on the journey, some tough old mercenary a friend of a friend said was good with children.” The Khajiit shrugged. “Did you not tell Ahnraji she lives in a hut in the swamps of Glenumbra? Who in Alinor would know better of her, or seek her out to check? Besides, it is not wholly untrue."

Mathis spread his hands and inclined his head to her, then looked back to the children. "As good an answer as we have, just now. Any questions?"

"We've never been to Anvil," said Ada. "What if someone asks us about it?"

"I've been there; I can tell you there's ships, a lighthouse, a statue of a mermaid, and a chapel. Little else, really. If anyone asks, say you miss the mermaid statue and all your little friends," Mathis droned in his bored monotone, and waved a dismissive hand. "No one expects children to have complex opinions, and I'll let you in on a secret: most adults are only asking to play nice, and won't mind a word you say for longer than it takes you to say it, as long as it’s nothing alarming to them. If they won't care, then you don't either." He pushed off from the counter. "Right then. Anything else?" Benny raised her hand. "Yes? Wait, give me a moment… Bernadette?"

Benny nodded. "Can I have my own room?" she asked.

"I have two rooms for the five of you, I'll leave it to you to battle out the distribution as long as it's bloodless, and to that end--" he pointed to Ada, "I wouldn't challenge Adalene. She has a sword.

“Ahnraji, they're yours for the day. I've appointments to keep."

Ada laughed a little, despite herself, as he slunk out of the room, but quickly straightened her face.

She didn’t have to like Mathis.


End file.
